VillanousOne

how many chances can we miss!

ah cheers

is Ireland injured?

why isn't Ireland in the squad?

Nah, this is wrong. The religion of the Arab world wasn't even founded "thousands of years ago", and Jews and Muslims mostly got on very well (notable exceptions aside) until after WWII. Throwing in a "Oh a Jew would never sell to an Arab"-type comment is off-topic, bigoted, and historically stupid. Stupid? Well I think they deserved to be called on it. But your point is fair enough, so I'll shut up about it. this debate has no place on a football forum

why are people turning on each other and bickering over religion now? For god's sake get a grip some of you!

I think blaming Dunne for our defensive problems is pretty hard to prove or disprove either way. He definitely has more skill on the ball than any other defender we have and tries to link defence and midfield without hoofing it. He blocks and tackles well. But he also is prone to lapses of concentration own goals and totally losing people on set pieces, but no worse than any other defender. Right now we need drive, motivation and experience and he brings that and without Collins we have little choice.

yep he is a fouling referee fooling play acting utter c..U..N..T!

who is this Bannon you speak of? Is he the more talented brother of Barry Bannan?

I think Heskey has had a few good moments for us even if we hate to admit it, Curtis Davies was an ok player bought for a disasterous amount of money

he'll never leave Southampton though

its topical as we are playing Sunderland, or did you not know that? Or are you Randy Lerner?

i hear we are lining up Brian Little also

Ellis will never sell the club

The below was on Vital Football: http://www.astonvilla.vitalfootball.co.uk/article.asp?a=7511905 Great: Stylian Petrov, John Carew, Ashley Young, Brad Friedel, James Milner Good: Luke Young, Stewart Downing, James Collins Average: Chris Sutton, Phil Bardsley, Nigel Reo-Coker, Brad Guzan, Carlos Cueller, Richard Dunne Poor: Shaun Maloney, Marlon Harewood, Curtis Davis, Nicky Shorey, Fabian Delph, Stephen Warnock. Disaster: Didier Agathe, Gabor Kiraly, Wayne Routledge, Moustapha Salifou, Zat Knight, Scott Carson, Steve Sidwell, Emile Heskey, Habib Beye ------------- I would class it more as this: Great: Ashley Young, Brad Friedel, James Milner Good: Stylian Petrov, John Carew, Luke Young, Stewart Downing Average/Ok: Chris Sutton, Phil Bardsley, Nigel Reo-Coker, Brad Guzan, Carlos Cueller, Richard Dunne, James Collins, Stephen Warnock, Fabian Delph, Emile Heskey Poor: Shaun Maloney, Marlon Harewood, Curtis Davis, Nicky Shorey. Disaster: Didier Agathe, Gabor Kiraly, Wayne Routledge, Moustapha Salifou, Zat Knight, Scott Carson, Habib Beye So many of those players if they had actually been given a chance and played would have been classed better. What do you think?

when we had Keane, Bent, playing and Zog and Ireland involved we started to play ok - not great mind but ok. The trouble is now we have no consistency, how many times have we put out the same team this season? if you look at potentially the optimum team we could play in terms of skill and experience at the start of the season - (how many times have we been able to do that?) Gabby, Bent Zog - Ireland - Petrov - Albrighton Warnock - Dunne - Collins - Hutton Now the chances of McCleish playing the above are quite unlikely as two wide men and a creative midfielder is an impossibility under him. But you have to say there should have been enough quality above to keep us mid table from Christmas onwards when Ireland had started to come good and if the injuries hadn't racked up. The trouble is there is no spine to the team anymore. who in the current line up would get in another prem team, who in the current line up would look out of place in the Championship? Given, Zog, Ireland, - who else would you actually want in your starting 11 if you were a Prem manager? Youngsters should be risked as attacking options not as holding midfielders and defenders, for those roles it helps to have guile and experience - especially if like Herd, Baker and Clark you aren't technically and positionally that astute. I am not defending McCleish, he is just a responsible as the fact we have lost 80% of the talent we had, but is it really any wonder we are terrible?

Well it seems according to Eck that Cuellar and Zog weren't quite fit enough to start the last two games, so its a good bet they will start v Sunderland. But I just can't predict a starting line up out of the squad - i would play Given Lichaj - Collins - Cuellar - Warnock Carruthers (or Albrighton) Clark - Ireland - Zog Weimann - Heskey I would love to see the above and for us to use attack as the best form of defence. But i doubt Eck would drop Gabby or Hutton so it's more likely to be this: Given Hutton - Collins - Cuellar - Lichaj Bannan - Herd - Zog Ireland - Gabby - Weimann or some such variation. He never plays a semi-attacking 442 as he shits himself if we have too much creativity on the wings as playing down both channels might mean we have a supply line and score and we wouldn't want that!

if we don't start with Nzogbia and Cuellar we have no chance

Weimann, Heskey Nzogbia, Clark, Gardener, Carruthers Lichaj, Cuellar, Collins, Hutton Given

count how many superlatives the commentators use, for the perfect, fabulous in the mood champions! they don't stop sucking them off for one second.

Savage is an utter dickless ball muncher with the IQ of a grey pube.

Probably because we don't have any fully fit wingers to spare. so who the hell are Nzogbia and Carruthers then part time fish mongers?

No width and no Cuellar = huge loss as opposed to a mild drubbing Eck has a real issue with playing with width/wingers doesn't he? Surprised he hasn't stuck Heskey on the pitch as a natural effective wide-man, oh wait....

well they might have been full of ego and complacency had Wigan of all teams not beaten them, with QPR and Wigan now up our arse - and a win needed expect Eck to set us up to lose at least 4:0 and at least one incredible refereeing decision that awards Manure: 1) An offside goal 2) A penalty 3) An unfair sending off 4) A player that should have been sent off for Utd but wasn't!

There is no excuse for how badly we did last season with the players available. We had Downing, Young, Albrighton and K Walker all playing a blinder for us with D Bent also doing well. At this point in time we have Ireland playing well and a flashes of inspiration from the younger players and inconsistency from the other senior players - but little to hang your hat on, and that is 50% down to McCleish and 50% due to the squad he has at his disposal, a squad in my opinion that wouldn't look out of place in the Championship.